Thank you to NetGalley for this arc in exchange for an honest review!

This book was a sweet read!
I adored the main character and how dedicated she was to making her friends and family happy despite the stress and consequences of attending all of these weddings.

However, there was A LOT of body shaming in this book and it made it incredibly hard to get through as it was just so disheartening to read. The characters were incredibly bitchy and mean (and I understand why for the story) but constantly reading about how they were body shaming one another wasn't fun for me.

This book has a great premise- a 32 year old woman who works in PR gets asked to be in five weddings all within the same two months. Two are for her younger siblings. She starts writing an anonymous blog about her experiences.

I read this book in one evening and thought it was a fun light read. Lily, the main character was well developed. Some of the side characters were less so, and all the brides turned into some version of bridezillas which was the most cliche part that I enjoyed the least.

There is a romance storyline as well that was a slow burn and there was good build up which I enjoyed. I liked the authors writing style and found it engaging.

This book is great for anyone looking for an fairly light fun read that does have good character development and an interesting premise and plot. Not the kind of book I will revisit or read over and over again but definitely an enjoyable read!

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher, and The author for the ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.

I was thrilled to have the opportunity to review an ARC of For the Love of Friends by Sara Goodman Confino. Can you imagine being in five weddings in one year? What if all the weddings were within two months, you were perpetually single and oh yeah two of the weddings were for your younger siblings. Yeah I know sounds terrible right, but it would make a great book and it did! Lilly is a thirty-two year old PR person for a science foundation who lives in DC with a roommate. She happily agrees to all of these weddings then watches as the brides become more and more insane and she decides to blog about it to try and make some more money pay for these weddings. I loved Lilly and was with her 100% on the blog. Everything happening to her was absurd from a chest minimizer to having to room with her Grandma at a destination wedding. I would definitely recommend to anyone who happens to be in a few weddings!

I read this book in two days because I needed the distraction. It's a fun, light read. My experience was that it lacked some depth when it came to the characters, but I loved that Lily, the protagonist, was a level-headed, confident woman. I usually prefer romance and chick lit when I need light reads, and I was getting weary of women protagonists/narrators who feel so badly about themselves--to an extent that they look down on themselves. Confino does a wonderful job of breaking that pattern in 'For the Love of Friends.' It was refreshing to get to know Lily :)

You know this is a good book when it made you rewatch 27 dresses after reading it. This book is more practical though because let's be honest, no one has 27 real friends.

Lily is under the stress of being a bridesmaid for 5 weddings, all happening within 2 months. All the demands from her soon to be bride friends is no joke to her bank account and the attitude from other bridemaids is making her blood boil. To make it worse, she is under pressure for being single at 32 years old and everyone around her including her 24 years old baby sister is getting married instead. Lily did what she does best to release the stress and frustration- writing. She wrote her bridemaid's journey on blog. When this backfired, Lily needs to think and act fast to save her friendships, relationship with her family and the only man she ever loved.

What I love about this book:
-Lily is very talented at writing, all her blog post is hilarious.
-It is not the perfect ending. It is too good to be true if Lily managed to earned her forgiveness from all her friends. However, I am sure eventually Lily will have her friend back because despite her snarky post, she is a good friend in heart.
- Highly recommend if you are looking for light and funny story about friendship, family and wedding stuff.

What do a best friend, a best work friend, a former college roommate and two siblings have in common? They are all scheduled their nuptials with weeks of each other and asked Lily Weiss to be a bridesmaid. Yes, without a hint of romance in her own life, Lily has agreed to be in all five weddings.

In this debut novel, Sara Confino takes us down the rabbit hole of high drama in modern day weddings with the expenses, personality conflicts and bridal demands – all with great humor, snark and pathos. Faced with the possibility of mounting debit and frustration with the interpersonal dynamics, Lily decides to put her Journalism degree to good use by creating a blog to generate income and let off steam. To her delight she rediscovers her love of writing, which has been buried under her daily work of writing press releases for a scientific organization. As the weeks progress and the wedding planning and activities take on a frenzied pace, the blog, authored anonymously, begins to take on a life of its own. You can probably guess what happens, but the outcome is still satisfying.

Lily is a delightful character – likeable and flawed in a very relatable way. The brides, their attendant bridesmaids, and mothers at times are a bit overdrawn and melodramatic, but overall they reflect the insanity hinted at if you watch even one episode of “Say Yes to the Dress.” I particularly appreciated Lily’s self-reflection and maturity as she embraced responsibility for her efforts and looked to the future.

I look forward to more books by this author.

My thanks to the author, Lake Union Publishing, and NetGalley for the privilege of reviewing a digital ARC in exchange for an independent, honest review.

This review is being posted immediately to my GoodReads account and will be posted on Amazon upon publication.

The perfect summer read!

Hilarious, charming and you were with Lily every step of the way – you felt her highs and you felt her lows – through all the weddings and personal dramas. It was seriously gripping, I couldn't put this one down as I just needed to know what was going to happen next. Plus, it was so, so funny – I was laughing from the first page.

Exactly what I was looking for in a chick-lit book, I can't believe this was Sara Goodman Confino's debut – it was incredible! I will absolutely be keeping an eye out for her next release.

I've got mixed feelings about this book. The writing style was a bit all over the show, and it seemed overly full of drama to the point it was no longer realistic even for a romance novel. The overall premise would've been good but I found it too hard to read so wouldn't recommend

Thanks to NetGalley for a arc copy for a honest review.

For The Love Of Friend’s was a fun read I love Lilly she was so much fun to read she has a busy life I give this book 3 star’s

Happy Reading

Lisa

For the Love of Friends is an excellent novel by Sara Goodman Confino.

Lily is a single 30-something who has 5 weddings to attend in a 3 month period. Plus she’s a bridesmaid in all of them. Look I have been in a wedding party once and the drama – just not worth it.

The book follows Lily in the lead up to all the weddings as she struggles with handling the cost and the personalities. Lily decides to take to blogging anonymously about her experiences which allows her to be honest about her experience in a way she simply couldn’t be with the brides.

The writing style is addictive and flows nicely, the characters are all iconic from overbearing mothers, to crazy bridesmaids. Lily is flawed and relatable, perhaps her thoughts were too close to mine which is making me reflect a lot about me.

Look after 2020 we are all looking for a light and captivating read to give our brains a break, I wholeheartedly suggest you give For the Love of Friends a try.

I was given a NetGalley ARC in exchange for a review.

“With that settled, there was the issue of keeping the details of five weddings straight. I, to put it mildly, lacked major organizational skills.”

Lily Weiss is a 32 year old Journalism graduate working as an unfulfilled science journalist. She says yes to being a bridesmaid in 5 weddings, all taking place within weeks of the other….including the parties, bridal showers, and many, many dress fittings for each. As a way to vent about the various terrible and stressed people she meets, and her lack of passion in writing about the latest gamma ray experiments, Lily creates an anonymous wordpress blog: Bridesmania.

This book surprised me. From the description I was expecting something more similar to Jenny Colgan – a fun mostly light story with a bit of a puzzle or suspense throughout. Like a nice book to read on a chilled evening, you know? I didn’t bargain for quite so much drama!

As the voice and main character of the book, Lily was warm, likeable, and entertaining. I enjoyed that we both heard Lily’s thoughts and got to read the blog posts she wrote too. Because of this, I was so involved in her thoughts that some of the twists and turns in the story were unexpected, simply because she hadn’t thought about it and so neither did I.

Falling into this book was instantaneous, and had I not had to put it down to eat I would have read it in one sitting. I fully credit this to the talent of the author’s writing, as normally I’m not one for this sort of drama in a book. The plot moved along at a good pace, I felt neither rushed nor wished it would speed up at any point. I only wanted to rush through it a bit because I am an impatient reader and, despite my previous claim of “not being one for this sort of drama in a book”, I really wanted to know what was going to happen!

My only critique is that sometimes the events and people felt like teenagers in high school, although it is true that (unfortunately) people like this exist. I also felt her reactions (aside from the snarky anonymous blog) were sometimes unrealistic, although it may just be that she is a better person than I am. Saying that, Lily’s room-mate, Becca, did say her life was turning into a reality TV show- so I guess I can’t complain!

I would definitely recommend this to anyone who wants to read a book filled with drama, friendship, and humour. It left me kind of wanting a sequel, especially after the last few pages – although I can’t say why as that would be a spoiler!

For the love of friends was a sweet read, and a great distraction during a turbulent time aka the pandemic. I liked that the ending was wrapped up in a bow and that there was some self reflection at the end. I would definitely recommend as a light read and would definitely read again!

#ForTheLoveOfFriends #NetGalley